The VLT, which was updated in 2017 to better detect potentially habitable planets, is comprised of four telescopes that operate at visible and infrared wavelengths.
It has shed new light on planets around a nearby star, L 98-59, that resemble those in the inner Solar System, including this new ocean-based exoplanet.
“The planet in the habitable zone may have an atmosphere that could protect and support life,” said María Rosa Zapatero Osorio, an astronomer at the Centre for Astrobiology in Madrid, Spain.
The results are deemed to be an important step in the quest to find life on Earth-sized planets outside the Solar System.
The detection of biosignatures on an exoplanet depends on the ability to study its atmosphere, but current telescopes are not large enough to achieve the resolution needed to do this for small, rocky planets.
The newly studied planetary system, named L 98-59 after the star, is an attractive target for future observations of exoplanet...